


Fun and Games

by intodusk



Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: Canon Compliant, Genderfluid Character, Major Spoilers, Nonbinary Character, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-11-04
Packaged: 2019-06-28 00:47:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15696753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/intodusk/pseuds/intodusk
Summary: In the wake of Leet's passing, Über runs away with the travelling Circus and tries to figure out where he's taking his act from here.





	1. Something Old, Something New

**Author's Note:**

> This is a short fic about the failed relationship between Über and Circus following Leet's death and where that road took them after. It starts around halfway through canon and will wrap up after the end of Worm itself, so read at your own peril, spoiler-wise. If you're still game, If you're down to clown, then enjoy.

Deserts, he figured, must have been devised to punish humanity for straying from their bounds.  
  
The searing bright of the sun overhead substantiated his theory, broiling his bare arms and shins, melting his sunscreen so it drooled into his eyes. The rest of the sky stretched out in a pale, empty blue, while the soil was smothered in coarse shrub and thorny trees, giving the impression that the clouds had long ago turned spiteful and cruel and were dragged aground by the weight of their own ugliness. The humid breeze hurt more than it helped, as the moisture only made the heat it draped over him more tangible.  
  
The fact that it was nearly the dead of winter seemed both nonsensical and distressingly believable. In Brockton Bay, days with highs in the upper 80’s were enough to get people panicked about global warming for at least a few hours. Here in Caatinga, where the seasons stood inverted and the topsoil trapped warmth like a pot lid, that breed of vulnerability had to be either sloughed off or grueled out to make way for a Stockholm sort of acceptance. For him, that was still a work in progress.  
  
He kneaded the fabric of the mask in his hand. He had to hold it at an awkward angle, nearly vertical, to keep the shattered remains of its cyclopean lens from catching the sunlight and glinting him blind. Its functionality evaded him; he'd sort of gathered that its features were meant to evoke some specific myth or figure, but he'd never been invested in that sort of thing, and the tech wedged into its form was even further beyond his understanding. It was probably beyond anyone’s, now.  
  
He looked it over one last time, then, after a false start, tossed it into the grave. He turned to Circus, who was leaning on the shovel planted by the dirt pile, wearing cotton clothes loose over their lithe frame, somehow unbothered by the conditions. They nodded, straightened, and handed him back the shovel.  
  
Filling it up again was easier than digging it, except for the first few shovelsful. The sunscreen crawled down his neck while he worked, mingling with his sweat, and the streaks his shirt didn't catch at the collar dribbled down his chest. By the time he was done, the sweat had subsumed it completely.  
  
He held the shovel out. “Here, could you-” He licked his chapped lips. “The rock, please.”  
  
Circus gave him a look but took the shovel from him and pushed it away into thin air, making it disappear. They pulled the stone from the same not-place, supporting it with both hands, and transferred it to his.  
  
He rounded the grave’s edge with a wide margin and placed the improvised marker at the head. He adjusted its position some, then retread his steps and took in the scene.  
  
A clearing in the otherwise thistle-choked scrubland, backdropped by distant mountains. A patch of disturbed dirt in the center of the clearing, marked by the dry, lifeless tangles of roots dug up in the process. A gravestone, as good as could be made in so little time. Two words, a name, carved cleanly into its face with a flathead screwdriver and the help of his power.  
  
All in all, there were worse final resting places. Probably.  
  
He was committing the sight to memory when Circus spoke up. “I'll wait in the truck.” They turned without waiting for a response.  
  
He shook his head. “No, it's… that's about it, I think. That's enough.”  
  
He followed them back to the rust bucket they'd arrived in and climbed into the passenger seat. It rode rough and overheated if they didn't stop every hour to sizzle on the side of the road, but it moved and it had a wide bed and a tarp, and thieves couldn't be choosers.  
  
Not when they needed to keep their heads down, at least.  
  
It didn't take them long to rejoin the highway, trading untamed earth for pavement. The ride wasn't all that much smoother for it, but the reduced jostling meant the suspension squeaked less. He propped an arm on the open window, leaned his stubbly jaw into his hand, and watched arid nothingness pass by as the wind wicked away his sweat.  
  
Minutes passed like that before Circus spoke again. “So. Was his name really Derrick?”  
  
He lifted his head to look at them. Their dark hair was whipping around just above their jawline, and at some point they'd pulled a toothpick and a pair of aviators from nowhere and were chewing on one and wearing the other. Not for the first time that day, he wished he'd picked up shades of his own, before things had gone to shit.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
They grunted, almost a laugh. “Fits.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
He leaned his head back into his hand, then lifted it again and let his forearm drape over the door. He squinted out at nothing, trying to ignore the notion that was simmering half-recognized in his gut. He shifted around in his seat, fanned himself by the collar of his shirt, cracked his knuckles one by one. When his fidgeting lapsed, words bubbled up into his throat.  
  
“Should I have done more?”  
  
They turned to him, then back to the road. “I wouldn't’ve.”  
  
“You didn't really know him though.”  
  
They shrugged. “Didn't seem like there was much to know. He played video games, he made shit Wile E. Coyote wouldn't touch, and he called people slurs when he thought they couldn't hear. Includin’ me. I think that's worth about what you gave ‘im.”  
  
“That's not what I meant.”  
  
Despite the sunglasses, he could tell they were rolling their eyes. “Well, what more would you’ve done? It's not like we were rolling in options.”  
  
He sighed through his nose. “I don't know. It just feels a little too… normal? Even with his name on there I don't think anyone would look at that and think it was his.”  
  
“Maybe that's a favor.”  
  
He ran a hand through his close-cropped hair, then started scratching when he reached the back of his head. “If I'd had more time and a bigger rock I could've carved something extra. A joke, probably.” He hummed. “Here lies Derrick Fleming, he died of dysentery.”  
  
They snorted. “Alright, yeah, he’d’ve deserved that.”  
  
He wasn't sure if they meant that as derision or not. He didn't ask. His eyes traced the mountains, his chin reacquainted itself with his hand, and time washed over the windshield like oil over water.  
  


~/\^/\^/\~

  
They spent the rest of day's light putting as much distance between them and Fortaleza as they could, stopping only for food, fuel, and the whims of the engine. At one point, Circus produced a map they'd lifted from some gas station, replaced their hands on the wheel with a knee, and scoured the routes. They spent a good couple minutes like that, driving without looking like it was as easy as breathing, and he wondered how much of that was their power and how much was simple confidence.  
  
They wrapped up the night at a small town motel priced to gouge travellers and tourists for the privilege of being mostly roach-free. After insisting on wearing a blonde selection from their myriad collection of wigs, Circus nabbed them each a single from the mousey old woman working the counter. She gave Circus the kind of once-over he'd learned not to do early on, but they ignored it. The two of them passed a pair of vending machines on their way to the rooms and he stopped at the one with drinks, looking over their selection of all things bubbly, caffeinated and/or sugary. They had an impressive variety of canned coffee drinks, though the time he’d spent in Brazil so far had already taught him to expect as much.  
  
“C’mon,” Circus said, grabbing him by the shoulder, “you don't have to fuck around with that, I've got more good booze in my space than they've got kiddie swill in there.”  
  
He brushed their hand off. “No thanks, don't drink. Just gonna grab a coffee.”  
  
If they'd been surprised by his first statement, they were baffled by his second. “The hell are you talking about? It's past ten, and we've gotta be up early if we want to jump the next forty miles of morning traffic.”  
  
The coin slot accepted his 25 centavos coins and the button for his choice lit up when pressed. “I know. I'll get a couple more for the road tomorrow. It's just, I need to process some stuff. It's not something I can sleep on.”  
  
When he'd retrieved his can and turned back to Circus, they were giving him a look he didn't understand. He was about to spur them on when they groaned, grabbed him by the arm and led him to the rooms. They used the keys to open the door to one, tossed some things from their space onto the bed, and shut and locked the door. They then opened the other, dragged him inside, closed the door behind them and sat in a little chair set kitty-corner from the bed.  
  
“Alright,” they said, drawing one leg up to rest a foot, sandal and all, on the seat, while the other sprawled further out. “Let's get this over with.”  
  
Bewildered, he said, “What?”  
  
“Siddown.” They nodded at the bed.  
  
He sat, but still asked, “Why?”  
  
“Because you need to talk about this or you'll sulk through the whole ride tomorrow, and I'd rather play stupid road trip games with you than listen to the radio the whole time.”  
  
Their answer caught him off-guard, and, not knowing how to respond, he simply said, “Why?” again. He immediately realized that wasn't the right answer when they leveled an irritated glare at him. “No, wait, I mean… I don't even know what it is that's bothering me so much. Beyond, y’know, him- him being dead.”  
  
“Then just talk.” They summoned a beer bottle and a bottle opener, popped the cap, and dismissed the opener. “Can’t get anywhere if you ain’t moving.”  
  
Rubbing his brow with his free hand he said, “I could... tell you about him, maybe. How I knew him.”  
  
They shrugged.  
  
He opened his own drink and sipped. It tasted of cinnamon and milk. He rested his elbows on his thighs and took a heavy breath. “I had a brother. Older brother, by a good six years and change. He… he died, when I was almost done with eighth grade. Leukemia, and we couldn't get anyone with powers to help him. I got mine after, even though they wouldn't have helped anyway.”  
  
“Powers,” they said. “Go figure.”  
  
He looked up at them, then back down. “I didn't know what to do with myself, much less my powers, so I started to drift. Going through days doing the bare minimum, not talking to anyone I didn't have to, that sort of thing. And then summer vacation rolled around and I stopped seeing my friends from school. When I finally got stir-crazy enough to leave the house, I just wandered around the Boardwalk. You remember that arcade they used to have there, with all the old-school cabinets?”  
  
They shook their head. “Used to? Leviathan or Burnscar?”  
  
“No, neither. It went by the wayside a couple years ago. Most arcades have, now. Way back when, though? It saw some good days. My brother was on the tail end of that, hung out there when he was barely a teenager and the place had more people than games, and when my parents wanted to get away from us they had him take me with. We went a lot. He lost interest eventually, and I did too, but passing by the place after he was gone… well.”  
  
Another sip. “I got it in my head that I'd get the Frogger cabinet to myself, since the place looked so dead. But when I found it, Derrick was already there, all scrawny and hunched the way he got, glued to the screen, with a stack of quarters on the rim taller than my thumb. I had nothing else to do, so I watched him play and waited for a turn. He didn't even realize I was there until he ran out, and-” he chuckled, a low and ember-warm sound, “and I think he thought I was there just to watch him.”  
  
A smirk tugged at their mouth. “Sounds about right.”  
  
“Yeah, doesn't it. So we play some games together, ‘cause we were about the only ones there that day, and we just… worked. I didn't mind him dragging me from game to game and he didn't mind that I didn't talk much. I kept meeting him at the arcade after that, and then we hung out at home too, and yeah. It wasn't even something to think about, after we found out we both had powers; it was just the next step. He needed some backup, I needed someone to point me towards things to do, and we both wanted to have some stupid fun. He had his own set of issues, sure. Lots of ‘em, and he dealt with them in the worst way: taking it out on others. And I should’ve done more about that, I know. But as far as me and him went? It worked.” He drained half of what was left of his coffee. “You probably know the rest, or at least enough of it.”  
  
Circus didn't say anything, letting him stew in memory for a minute. He welcomed it- he wasn't sure he'd have been able to respond at the moment. Reminiscing so much had left him treading water in a sea of feelings too great to be named, had poked holes in the numb he'd worn all day, and it was taking most everything in him not to break down in front of someone he still didn't know very well.  
  
When he spoke again, his voice was quiet, strained: “I sort of knew it was gonna happen, that he'd die early. It wasn't a conscious thing but I was… anticipating it, for somebody we pissed off to one day come back steaming and packing real power, or- or for physics or electrodynamics or whatever to hit back so hard he wouldn't get up. I wasn't ready for someone to just… shoot him. Like a regular human being.” He moved to take a sip but hesitated, grimacing, before the can reached his lips. He sighed and lowered it, brow furrowed, eyes sunk beneath the swirls of dregs. “That doesn't sit right.”  
  
After a patient, necessary moment of quiet, Circus said, “So, where do you wanna go from here?”  
  
He sucked in a breath, gathering himself back into his self. “Well, we're on our way back to Mexico, right? And we've got all the money we need to lay back for a long while, wherever we each go from there. I figured that was what you had in mind.”  
  
They finished off their beer, belched, and reared an arm back to fling the bottle behind them. Animal panic almost found a foothold in his heartbeat, but the bottle vanished when it left their hand, and he exhaled his relief through his nose. “Close, but I wasn't planning on just laying back.”  
  
“Oh?”  
  
“Yeah, oh.” They put one foot back on the carpet and drew the other back in, leaning forward. “I don’t know about you, but I’m not one to stand still for too long. We’re still allowed to do what we do best, long as we use different names, right? Way I see it, the cash just means I don’t have to worry too much about payoffs or fencing. It’ll be all about the challenge.”  
  
He nodded slowly. “Not a bad way to think about it. Gonna run the solo cat burglar thing again, I assume?”  
  
“Actually, I was thinkin’ I’d ask if you wanted to join.”  
  
He blinked. “Huh?”  
  
“You heard me.”  
  
Frowning, he said, “But you’ve been doing the lone wolf thing for years. And I know it wasn’t because Coil asked you to; from what I heard you could’ve been on the Undersiders if you’d wanted. So why me?”  
  
They considered the question. “Well… if there's one thing I got from the snake that wasn't money, and it probably is just the one, it's that connections matter. And here, now? You're about my whole list. And I think I’m most of yours, too. So.”  
  
He worried his lower lip. Trepidation and compulsion writhed against each other in his chest, tugging at his spine in opposing directions until one outgrew the other. “I- Okay. Okay. I’m in.”  
  
Flashing him a cheeky grin, they held out their hand. “Alex.”  
  
He matched one with a small smile and the other with his own and shook. “Scott.”  
  
“Yup, sounds right.” They stood and ambled over to the door. “Well, looks like my job here’s done. Do your thinking, go the fuck to bed eventually, and don’t knock on my door before six without a deathwish or a damn good reason. Oh, and here.” They tossed him his room key, opened the door, gave him a mock-salute and said, “Welcome to the team, Übergoober,” before shutting it.  
  
He sat staring at the chair for a moment before rising off the bed. He dumped the dregs into the tiny sink in the back of the room and recycled the can. The bed, not as comfortable as it should have been, given what he’d paid for it, called to him nonetheless, and he kicked off his shoes and lay back over the sheets. With nothing else to do, he waited for the caffeine and his thoughts to work their ways out of his system.  
  
After some time, an idea wormed its way into his brain. It was absolutely ludicrous, so he dismissed it, but he couldn’t quite shake it, and the more it reappeared, the more it appealed to him.  
  
He rolled off the bed, slipped his shoes on, and left the room. He passed by more identical rooms before reaching the vending machines. The last of his centavos were lost to the slot in exchange for an energy drink with a gaudy black and neon green design. From there he made his way to the parking lot, then to the parking lot’s edge, where imperfect pavement gave way to dry, cracked earth. The ridiculousness of his intentions tried to drag him back inside, but when he considered his witnesses - the sleeping locals, the distant mountains, the hollow, speckled night - what he was doing seemed to make more sense, like his irrelevance in the scale of it all meant permission now.  
  
As far as the object of this farce went, a little inanity?  
  
He cracked the can open and poured it out onto the ground, where it splashed and fizzed and stained the dirt dark.  
  
It fit.


	2. Pompeii

“I still don't get why I'm dressed like this.”  
  
His curled fake moustache tickled his cheeks as he spoke. He fidgeted with the striped singlet, trying to shift it so the way it clung to his upper thighs didn't feel like a wedgie waiting to happen. For the hundredth time that night he wondered if he should have shaved his legs; this was the most body hair he'd ever bared and it detracted from the look, no matter how Alex assured him he looked fine. He felt far more like a sasquatch from the Great Depression gone swimming than an actual strongman.  
  
Alex gave him a deadpan look and, with the hand that wasn’t holding a stack of playing cards, gestured over their outfit, from the candy cane striped pants to the tailed red tux jacket to the top hat resting on their tangerine wig.  
  
He couldn’t follow up his question right away, lest he risk losing focus on the task at hand. His power guided the next card to its precarious position, careful not to disturb the rest of the tower. It’d nearly reached the ceiling of the stretch limo they'd stolen, more abstract sculpture or nightmare castle than house, featuring segments that separated into spires which supported the next section, impossible corbels that would make a junior architect cry, and a few portions that imitated curved surfaces. A pile of empty card boxes sat next to it on the minibar, whose crystal tumblers had been stored away. They wouldn’t be needing them; Scott had his bottled water waiting for him in the driver’s cupholder and Alex preferred to cut out the middleman between bottle and mouth.  
  
“No, I know. That’s not what I mean. Why a strongman specifically?”  
  
Alex took their turn, using one hand to place a trio of cards atop his, each holding up and held up by the other two. It was like putting one foot in front of the other for them. “What, you wanna be the fuckin’ dancing bear? Go around calling yourself The Juggler? Maybe Houdini it up, wear a straightjacket an’ some chains with padlocks. Look like some punkass basement dweller tryna be edgy. That what you want?”  
  
He rubbed his forehead. “There’s got to be something better than this, though. This is something a Brute would wear. I’m pure Thinker.”  
  
“It’s straightforward is what it is, and your power is good for fighting. Don’t knock it ‘cause it ain’t a perfect match. No one’s is, ‘sides mine.” They placed another nigh-untenable overhang, heedless that they’d skipped his turn. “Anyhow, you’ve at least got the figure for it. Just saying.”  
  
Despite it being, in terms of delivery, the least flirtatious compliment he’d received in his life, his cheeks warmed. He’d never known how to respond to compliments, especially ones about his body, and he got more than a few of those. “I guess. It’ll do for now, but I’ll keep trying to think up something better.”  
  
“You do that, Mr. Thinker.” They flicked the last card from their stack into the air, sending it into a somersaulting arc that ended with it stood on the overhang and leaning on one of the self-supporting trio. They shifted to the edge of their seat, ready to stand. “Me, I’m thinking we’ve waited enough. Ready to not fuck anything up?”  
  
“Yeah, just- let me get this last part.” Re-immersing himself in his power, he used a pair of cards to expand upon the overhang, reinforce it as a base for the square turret he built atop it. When it was a mere couple inches away from contact with the limo’s ceiling he held his breath and moved to place the final two cards into position.  
  
“Oh shit, no, I’ve got it-”  
  
With his focus (and thus, his skill) lost, he wavered, hand bumping into the turret and felling it. It in turn knocked the sections below it out of balance in a cascade of collapse.  
  
“Whoa there, cowboy.” They snatched up the cards as they fell, swiping through the ruins-in-progress and dropping the resulting stack on the bar before going back for more. It reminded him of competitive cup-stacking except with heightened numbers and volatility. He'd done something similar on stream, once, except with proper regulation cups. Derrick had managed to put together a machine that both materialized and set up the cups and only rarely spat out a ball of molten plastic instead, and-  
  
And he pulled the brakes on that train of thought, trying not to let his wince show. “So what is it you've got?”  
  
Alex shoved the last stack into a box and it vanished into their space. It was anyone’s guess if they'd bothered maintaining proper decks of 52 or not. “We have you roll in an’ out of joints in a big metal ring, on some Cirque du Soleil shit. Call you  _Sir Cyr_.”  
  
He sighed. “Let's, uh, put that on the backburner. I'm ready.”  
  
“Strongman it is, then.” They slapped a cheap domino mask into his palm to match theirs, crouch-walked over to one of the doors, opened it without a sound and stepped out into the street.  
  
He followed, and found the night quieter than he’d anticipated. In Brockton Bay, even in the neighborhoods as affluent as this one, rare was the night that one couldn’t catch hints of distant gang conflict on the wind, in mixed-and-matched flavors of neo-Nazis, hyperviolent drug dealers, Pan-Asian racketeers, and Protectorate lapdogs. Rumour and legend had led him to expect the same (if not worse) of Mexico City, with cartel and government capes clashing left and right, or low-level runners and enforcers scuffling in the streets, no less deadly for the smaller scale. In the face of this picturesque street, of cobbled sidewalks and trimmed greenery and cool auditory peace, his simple imaginings abandoned him, resigned him to forming his own understanding from experience. He’d certainly have time for it.  
  
This was his home for the foreseeable future, after all.  
  
Ringleader rounded a corner and approached the target house and Strongman followed. It was an aggressively modern thing, a two-story mosaic of polished browns and greys stripped of curved lines and tucked away behind a long, narrow yard and towering hedges. A path around the side led them to the backyard, where smooth tiles in shades of beige surrounded a rectangular pool longer than their limo. A skinny tree provided just enough support for Ringleader to vault up and onto a second-story patio. Strongman managed it after, but had to pause in the middle to lose mastery of tree climbing in favor of gymnastic leaps. Once they were reasonably sure they wouldn’t trip any silent alarms, they slipped through the sliding glass patio door.  
  
The interior was a warm reflection of the exterior. They stepped light through sparsely decorated halls with hardwood floors and rooms done up in gentle neutral tones, picking up a painting here and a bottle of vintage wine there as they went. A visit to one of the bedrooms found a bed half the size of the pool and an antique vanity- likely the only such furnishing in the house. Multiple jewelry boxes disappeared into Ringleader’s space while Strongman examined a necklace with a white-gold chain, from which hung a gemstone the size of his thumb. The curious thing was that he’d found it hidden in the drawer of one of the end tables, separate from the rest of the jewelry, but he was a bit too mesmerized by its coloration to ponder that. A murky blueish green caught partway through the process of changing to red and crystalized, like blood clouding in seawater.  
  
Like Bonesaw’s miasma hanging over the bay.  
  
He whistled low. “Pays to be a congressman’s wife, huh?”  
  
Ringmaster looked over at what he was holding and snorted. “Congressman’s mistress, more like. No fuckin’ way he gives good stuff like that to his wife.” They took it from him and it too disappeared. “Now c’mon, we’re almost at the best part.”  
  
The main hall ended in a well-lit office that surprised him by being rather average in size, as well as windowless. A wide circular ceiling fixture made up for the lack of natural light. A too-stylish corner desk of tan wood and steel took up a good chunk of the room while a bookshelf devoid of tchotchkes occupied the opposite corner. From the wall between the two hung a rug, an intricate and multicolored masterwork of textiles that utterly failed to synchronize with the rest of the décor.  
  
Ringleader sighed. “People always think they’re so damn clever for this shit. Like the world works on Scooby-Doo rules an’ no one’ll think twice about the big stupid rug on the wall. It’s boring, is what it is.” They pulled it from its pinnings and it piled up on the floor, revealing the door to a wall safe the size of a small child. They looked back to him with lidded eyes. “Now I just feel insulted.”  
  
He examined the single combination lock and let out a mirthful chuckle. “Well, it should stop us for all of twenty seconds at least.”  
  
They moved to sit atop the desk by the monitor but didn’t put it into their space. “Alright Mr. Thinker, see if you can get it that fast. Otherwise after that twenty I’m bringing out the hammer.”  
  
He almost asked why they weren’t taking the computer but realized neither of them could actually make use of the parts. Instead he pressed an ear to the safe and lost himself in his power and the fine metallic clicks.  
  
He cracked the combination just as Ringleader pulled their streamer-covered sledgehammer from thin air. They unsummoned it with a muttered, “Fuckin’ spoilsport.” The door swung wide to reveal a storage space big enough to be divided by shelves. The topmost portion held two half-open cloth bags stuffed with stacks of banknotes bound by rubber bands. The middle shelf contained papers and binders and ledgers stacked neat atop one another. The bottommost space housed only a big, featureless black box.  
  
Ringleader pursed their lips. “Yeah, okay. For a first job by a couple of ‘new’ capes, this ain’t so bad. Check the box while I grab the cash, will ya?”  
  
He blinked. “Not going for the papers?”  
  
They swung a sack as if to throw it and it vanished. “I could give a shit who’s bribing him, the cash is right here.” The second sack followed the first. “And now it ain’t. Voilà, or whatever.”  
  
His attention returned to the box and he pulled it out. It was lighter than he’d thought it would be, having wondered if it might hold whatever gold bars or diamonds weren’t in the rest of the house. Opening the lid brought more surprises: the only contents were a sleek black motorcycle helmet and some folded-up material with odd patterning, black as the base and covered in orange-red cracks that seemed to ooze and glow. It was smooth to the touch and had a durability he could feel in its fibers and weight. It unfurled when he held it up, and it was only when he recognized the parts dangling from the center as sleeves and leggings that the reality of what he was looking at clicked.  
  
“Fuck.”  
  
Outright distress was a rare guest on Ringleader’s face, one he’d seen there only twice before, once during Echidna’s rampage and once in Fortaleza. Now it looked like it was trying to settle in, carving signs of stress into their features in deep lines. He was a tad puzzled at that; finding out a statesman either was or was supporting a cape was surprising, but not enough so to provoke a reaction like theirs. Before he could ask what was wrong, though, he heard a sound from somewhere below them.  
  
The front door being opened.  
  
“Fuck,” Ringleader reiterated. “Shit, _fuck_.”  
  
They took him by the arm and bolted for the door, and for a moment he had to struggle to keep from being outright dragged. Once he reclaimed his balance they quickened their clip, tearing through the hall, impeded only by the need to minimize noise. They were closing in on the sliding door to the porch when something big, orange and goopy crashed like a wave into Ringleader, forcing a cry from their throat and making them collapse to the hardwood floor. Strongman didn't even have the time to look back at his fallen teammate or attacker before something caught him on one leg, the one he was about to put his weight on to pivot. It failed him and he stumbled, falling prone just a few feet from the open door.  
  
The first thing he did after propping himself on his hands and one knee was check on the state of his leg. The sensation of losing control of it had him whipped up in half a panic, but he could still feel it, and upon inspection it appeared to be fine, if covered from the knee down in something viscous and glowing. His heart rate jumped when he processed its striking similarities to molten lava, but the substance itself was only warm to the touch, not all that much hotter than his own skin, and showed no sign of hardening or giving off smoke. A glance to the side showed Ringleader splattered more liberally with the stuff but also unburnt, rolled onto their back and swearing like a sailor with a splinter under their breath. Their wig was still on but their top hat sat on the floor between them. The click of heels on wood drew his attention to the other end of the hall, from which their assaulter approached.  
  
She was a pristine, willowy vision in an indigo evening gown; smooth tan skin stretched over her skinny frame, taut against regally high cheekbones and a sharp jaw. Her straight brown hair was wrapped up in an elaborate bun and complemented by swept bangs, and a gleaming diamond necklace spoke of means to match the grooming. Two lone factors disrupted her image: first, her left arm was missing halfway down the bare bicep, and where there should have been a stump or a wound there was instead more of that magmatic substance, weeping a trail of drops behind her that led back to a vent. Second, her eyes were plate-wide with shock and fury and locked unerring on Ringleader’s face.  
  
“ _Years_ ,” she growled, and Strongman startled a little because it was a good deal lower than he’d expected. “ _Years_  of peace and quiet without my past rearing its  _ugly_  head, and just like that  _you_  come back and smash it all to bits.” She stopped a few steps away from them, her remaining fist clenched so hard it shook. Her eyes were still on Ringleader. “And what for, huh, Alex? To trash my house? To creep on my new life? To  _ruin_  my new life? What was so fucking important that you had to break our agreement?”  
  
He looked back to Ringleader with a new curiosity tempering his unease, but the woman had arrested their gaze. They chuckled, more wary than he’d ever seen them. “H-hey Mar, uh, long time no-”  
  
“ _You_ ,” she interjected, “do not get to call me that. Not after whatever you’ve pulled here.” When they tried to reply she cut them off again. “You don’t even get to call me Maria. Call me anything other than my cape name and I might not be able to stop myself from wringing your sweet, slender neck.”  
  
Ringleader, who’d just managed to prop themselves up on their elbows, raised their hands in an appeasing gesture, made awkward by their position. “Vesuvia, look, this really, actually ain’t what it looks like, okay? This was just supposed to be a regular job, stealing from some random congressman.”  
  
“But it wasn’t just some random one, was it?” She seethed. “It had to be my-  _this_  congressman!”  
  
Something shifted in Ringleader’s expression. They barked out a laugh. “Oh, wow, this is a fucking trip, ain’t it? You’re the mistress, aren’t you?” Their eyes narrowed, accusing and, if Strongman wasn’t mistaken, a little hurt. “That’s how you can afford all that. You’ve got a fucking  _sugar daddy_.”  
  
“It beats being a petty thief!” she shot back, waving her arm-and-a-half and spraying a bit of goop on the wall in the process. “And it’s more than that, alright? Stop making it sound so crude. He  _cares_  about me.  _He_  likes me for more than just what I am to him, something you never understood.”  
  
“Because that doesn’t make any sense!” They sneered at her. “What’re you even getting out of this, besides the money? He’ll never drop his wife and marry you, even if there weren’t a bunch of laws against it. He’s using you, using you for your powers and your…” They bit their lip. “...your body.”  
  
“His wife and I have an understanding. It’s complicated, but it works, because that’s how an actual relationship is. And don’t you-” A shudder ran through her and forced her lips together in a thin line, but she held on to her fire. “Don’t you even  _think_ about my body.”  
  
“I bet he’s not half as good as I was.”  
  
Vesuvia froze. “What did you just say?”  
  
“I bet,” they repeated, straining to push themselves closer to a sitting position, speaking low, slow, cutting, “that he ain’t even half as good as me.”  
  
“I’ll have you know-”  
  
“ _I_  never played you for a fuckin' fool.” They looked truly incensed now, teeth bared and messy strands of tangerine hair falling over their face. “ _I_  never made you play second fiddle.  _I_  never made you be some, some  _rich_ -”  
  
“Don’t-”  
  
“- _man’s_ -”  
  
“-you-”  
  
“- _WHORE!_ ”  
  
Vesuvia exploded into lava with a shriek of anger, her form and clothes disappearing into a humanoid mass of ruddy goo with a dripping maw and yellow eyes glowing so bright they were almost white. She lunged for Ringleader, but Strongman, thankful she’d been too focused on them to pay him much mind, executed the move he’d been preparing for. He snatched up the fallen top hat and flung it into her face. It disintegrated when it made contact, which he hadn’t been expecting, but still caught her by surprise, earning a moment’s hesitation that he used to clamber onto his good foot and drag Ringleader away by the arms.  
  
Vesuvia reared a dripping arm and whipped it back down, spraying a crest of magma their way. Strongman only just pulled them up and out of the way in time, incidentally sloughing the mass that’d covered them off onto the ground. They tried to stand on their own but their knees wobbled, and he was forced to lift them into a bridal carry that, by their indignant swearing, they were not happy about. Vesuvia, who was becoming more amorphous by the second, launched a wider spray this time, and rather than risking a dodge he jumped back through the open door and onto the patio. Hoping he was remembering the layout right, he used his momentum to leap with his good foot over the railing, clutching Ringleader close.  
  
The impact of his back hitting the water stung like all hell but still soaked him in relief. Whatever goop hadn't fallen off them already was lost now to the chlorinated depths. In short order he reoriented and pulled Ringleader and himself up to the pool’s edge. He dragged them out of the water just in time to see Vesuvia ooze through the patio railing like mud through a grate and plop onto the tiled ground, splattering lava. She seemed to move slower the more she lost her original shape. He scooped Ringleader up into his arms again and, before she could start flinging more coordination-sapping goop his way, hopped as fast as he could on one foot towards the path around the house’s side.  
  
He thanked all there was and might be that his power considered hopscotch a learnable skill.  
  
Partway down the path Ringleader struggled out of his grasp. “I’m good,” they insisted, matching his pace on almost-steady feet. “I’m good. It wears off quick.”  
  
He was a bit surprised, given he’d still not regained much function in his own affected leg, but figured their power probably helped compensate. They crossed the front lawn and found a bearded man in a sharp suit standing watch by the end of the driveway. His eyes widened as they approached but before he could do anything, Ringleader pulled a juggling pin from nowhere and loosed it his way. It hit him square in the forehead and he dropped limp. A garbled shriek of, “ _Asshole!_ ” from behind spurred the two of them to flee faster.  
  
They rounded the street corner they’d parked past, blocking Vesuvia’s view of them, hurried to the limo and, after a brief argument held in hissed whispers, piled into the front seats, with Strongman in the driver’s. He took off, taking care not to make the tires squeal and give away what care they were escaping in, and soon merged into the night traffic of a more major street. He was only just getting coordination back in his right foot so he had to reach over with his left to push the pedals, but he didn't have much trouble with it.  
  
It was the loudest silent drive he’d taken yet. Scott’s eyes stayed square on the road ahead, resisting every temptation to peek at the powder keg in the passenger seat. He could feel a heat unrelated to fire radiating from Alex, simmering just shy of boiling over. Not in all the time he’d spent with them had he seen them like this. He wondered if he should say something. He didn’t. He didn’t know what there was to say. So, instead, he just drove, searching the buildings they passed for somewhere to hide out. Mexico City wasn’t quite the post-industrial paradise of abandoned warehouses that Brockton Bay was, and he didn’t want to step on the toes of the existing villain population by accident, but he held out hope they’d find something eventually.  
  
When they were halfway across the city and he was bottoming out on hope as well as fuel, Alex spoke, startling him. Their tone was strained but soft. He wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or not. “Pull into this area. Let’s just park in front of that other house we scoped out.”  
  
He obliged, pulling off the main street and winding his way down a neighborhood almost as rich as the statesman’s. The house in question was three stories tall and its property limits stood wider, but its design was plain, almost homely. A stone gate blocked street view of the empty circular driveway, and even those that caught an oblique peek at their parking spot would find little unusual about a limo stationed by this place’s front door.  
  
They relocated to the back; Scott on one of the leather benches and Alex slumped on the floor, propped up against the counter of the minibar, looking empty. After a minute they peeled away their domino mask and let their dark hair free from under their disarrayed wig, tossing the items to nowhere. That reminded him he was still in full costume himself, so he pulled his own mask off. His fake moustache had gone askew at some point. It joined his mask on the leather.  
  
“Sorry.”  
  
He jolted, then tried to play it off like he was just rolling his shoulders. “Huh?”  
  
They gestured vaguely. “All that. She… she shouldn’a been there.” Their brow furrowed. “She shouldn't  _be_  there.”  
  
“What-” He coughed. “What went so bad between you two?”  
  
They met his gaze, stared through him, searched him. “You know I’m a cluster-trigger, yeah?”  
  
He nodded, and then it clicked. “Oh.”  
  
The corners of their lips tightened. “Yeah. Oh. The whole fuck/kill thing runs deep. An’ if you’ve got a, ah, history, like me an’ her, things get… muddled.” They shrugged. “Or ‘least that’s how it is for us.”  
  
He didn’t respond. Couldn’t; words wouldn’t come.  
  
“She just… I see her now, an’ I can’t stop from making an ass of myself, I just get so, so fuckin’  _mad_  an’ so…” They went a little red, biting their bottom lip like they were trying to chew it off. He would’ve thought the anger was dominant then if it weren’t for the look in their eyes, distant and squinting and pained.  
  
They shook their head, but the tightness in their features remained. “I gotta drink something nasty tonight.” A handle of cheap-looking (as far as he could tell) vodka appeared in their grip. They unscrewed the cap, chucked it nowhere and drank. Their nose scrunched up a bit, surprising him with how cute it was, and gave him another look. “You, uh, you want some? I know you ain’t much for drinks, and you don’t- not gonna make you do shit or nothing, but… if you were looking for a night to start, I’d, y’know, ‘preciate the company.”  
  
He hadn’t been, not particularly, but now that the opportunity was right there, right in front of him, he failed to decline. Wondering if it could really make a difference to them, if it could help lubricate his speech so he could say whatever they needed to hear, he found himself saying, “Why not,” and meaning it.  
  
They grinned, genuine, and broke out one of the crystal tumblers from a cubby in the minibar. From another they retrieved a tray of ice, only partially melted, and piled cubes into the glass. “Not the way most anyone drinks vodka, and really not the way anyone should, but I won’t make you go from the bottle for your first drink.”  
  
He accepted the drink, took a cautious sip, and was immediately thankful they hadn’t.  
  
It didn’t take him long to get tipsy, sips to Alex’s guzzling, and they teased him a few times for being a “two-ton lightweight.” Once they were both inches from drunk, Alex broke out the cards and taught him a game they called Speed. He lost more than he won, and he didn’t mind. The time passed like it wasn’t; there was just them, him, the slapping of cards on cards, and a very pleasant buzz in the back of his head. He could tell they were feeling it too, with the faces they made at him, the looks they shared and the small grins when he told a good joke. He knew they’d stopped thinking about Maria, and that feeling of accomplishment made the smiles he returned sincere.  
  
Eventually, when they were both yards  _past_  drunk, something came over Alex, or came through from them, and they spent a quiet moment just sitting there, steadying their breathing some. Their expression opened like a book and Scott almost wished he were sober enough to read it. “Hey, w’d’you mind… pourin’ me a… a glass?”  
  
Their voice rang different somehow, and it seemed to him like there should’ve been something odd about what they’d asked for, but it washed away with the moment. “Yep, yeah, can- hic! -can do.” He knelt in front of the bar, fumbling with with a second tumbler and trying not to spill any on the scattered cards. He'd just gotten the cap back on the handle when a pair of lean arms draped themselves over his shoulders, wrapped loose around his neck. He went still, couldn’t help but notice their bareness, notice he could see a tux jacket discarded on the floor in his peripheral. A stray finger stroked across his collarbone, sending a hot chill up his spine.  
  
“Scott?” Right in his ear, breathy, wispy.  
  
He swallowed the excitement suddenly gumming up his throat. “Alex?”  
  
A warm, wet sensation traced behind the shell of his ear and he bit down on a whine. “Want to?”  
  
He hesitated, but he couldn’t understand why. They’d caught him off-guard, again, and he knew he should probably be worried he’d mess something up or somehow underwhelm, but all the things that came to mind only nudged him to take the risk. He would be good at it, like he was good at everything. He would be  _useful_ , undeniably, in a way he’d never been before. He might even get to see that crinkle in their nose again.  
  
And besides, it’d worked out for him the first time.  
  
He licked his lips, closed his eyes and spoke his last coherent word of the night.


End file.
